


Ghost Within A Ghost

by livingvakariouslythroughyou



Category: Daredevil (TV), Jessica Jones (TV), The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: 2020 Daredevil Exchange, Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Daredevil Bingo, Daredevil Exchange, Darejones, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Gen, Happy Ending, Human Disaster Jessica Jones, Human Disaster Matt Murdock, Hurt/Comfort, Mind Control, Mostly still friends, Past Sexual Assault, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Whump, but they're on the way, canon-typical levels of alcohol consumption, i guess, messica - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:40:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26230543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livingvakariouslythroughyou/pseuds/livingvakariouslythroughyou
Summary: The man blinks, surprised, but nods his head a few times, considering. “What about sight? You didn’t mention that. Is that enhanced, too?”“No.”“And why not?” the man asks with an air of petulance, as though personally offended by Matt’s answer.“Because I’m blind,” Matt says with a shrug and a flat, matter of fact tone.This catches the man’s attention again. “What? Really? Come here,” he says and waggles his index finger, beckoning Matt over.Matt tries to resist, to fight the compulsion driving him to comply, he really does, but it’s as if he’s being controlled remotely and this man works the control panel. The desire builds subtly, like a fog. But as it rolls into his mind and down his spine, it wraps around his ankles. And then his feet move of their own volition, leading him to stand in front of the man.“Take off your mask.”----What if Matt met Kilgrave? And then, what if he met Jessica before the events of The Defenders? Canon AU set in JJ S1 in which Matt meets Kilgrave and learns first-hand what it's like to suffer under his control, until Jessica helps him escape.Written for Longdaysjourney in the 2020 Daredevil/Defenders Exchange.
Relationships: Jessica Jones & Matt Murdock, Jessica Jones/Matt Murdock, Matt Murdock & Zebediah Killgrave
Comments: 12
Kudos: 119
Collections: Daredevil Bingo, Daredevil and Defenders Exchange 2020





	Ghost Within A Ghost

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Longdaysjourney](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Longdaysjourney/gifts).



> Written for Longdaysjourney for the 2020 Daredevil Exchange. Prompts were: hurt/comfort & someone using Matt's powers against him, sensory overload, Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd, and selections from the play Long Day's Journey Into Night by Eugene O'Neill. Title is taken from one such monologue included as a preface.
> 
> Ohmygod, I'm the absolute worst!!! I'm so, so, so incredibly sorry this is late!!!! It really got away from me in terms of length, so oops. I hope it was worth the wait. Anyway, I hope you like it! It was super fun to write! Also fills my wild card space for AU canon divergence for Daredevil Bingo.

“The fog was where I wanted to be. Halfway down the path you can’t see this house. You’d never know it was here. Or any of the other places down the avenue. I couldn’t see but a few feet ahead. I didn’t meet a soul. Everything looked and sounded unreal. Nothing was what it is. That’s what I wanted—to be alone with myself in another world where truth is untrue and life can hide from itself. Out beyond the harbor, where the road runs along the beach, I even lost the feeling of being on land. The fog and the sea seemed part of each other. It was like walking on the bottom of the sea. As if I had drowned long ago. As if I was the ghost belonging to the fog, and the fog was the ghost of the sea. It felt damned peaceful to be nothing more than a ghost within a ghost.”

Eugene O’Neill in “Long Day’s Journey into Night”

* * *

He never would have suspected the man at first blush. The impeccable suit with the expensive cologne and fine Italian leather shoes all inform Matt that the man is definitely not in any kind of trouble; but from his perch on the top of the financial building on the northeast corner of the Diamond District at 47th St, Matt can already sense that trouble definitely seems to surround this man like a low-hanging fog. If not for the fight taking place down in the alley behind the financial building, Matt probably wouldn’t even have stopped on his way home (at least that’s what he tells himself later), as there seemed to be no reason to stop on account of the man alone. However, while making his way home after a particularly obnoxious night of keeping the peace, Matt registers a fight between two men, unremarkable except for the merciless way they are beating away at one another. But most surprising is the fact that they are just a few feet downwind of the well dressed man who is completely unconcerned by the racket behind him, not sparing a glance toward the bloody mess he’s leaving behind. 

Matt swings one retractable billy club around the fire-escape of the opposite building from where he has been observing, resolved he must intervene. He hurls toward the ground, holding onto the cable like a demented Tarzan, and when he get reaches the arch of his swing, his momentum carries him further, allowing him to do a flip as he dismounts. He lands in a crouch and reels in the wire of the club while he stays a few feet back from the dueling pair, reading the scene. They are unperturbed by his sudden appearance, continuing to pound away at one another as though fighting for their lives. But the third man notices him. And he stops dead in his tracks to watch while Matt debates how to address the fight still raging on before him, the cause of which he still has yet to determine. 

And as he gets closer to them, it’s like nothing he’s ever encountered. Taking a bracing breath and rolling his shoulders, Matt steps between the brawlers. He places one hand firmly in the center of each man’s chest, grabbing their collars in an attempt to keep them apart, but they refuse to back down, continuing to swing at one another feverishly. Their focus is so singular and all-consuming that a description of zombies from a book he once read pops into his mind. The hair on the back of his neck raises at the thought. In an attempt to rid himself of the image as much as to break up the fight, he tries talking them down. 

“Hey, guys, enough. You’re both in rough shape. Let’s call it a night, yeah?” he says, head pivoting between the two men, still holding them as far apart as he can manage while they fight against him. Matt spares a thought of gratitude that neither of the men are any stockier or stronger because though he is holding his own, with both of them throwing their weight against him so mindlessly, he nearly loses the upper hand at least once.

The response they give is eerie for the way it is a nearly perfect echo they repeat in tandem, as though they had rehearsed it multiple times over. “C-can’t stop. M-must fight” they rasp while struggling against Matt’s grip of their respective shirt collars, swinging errant punches that narrowly avoid his ribs on both sides.

Rapidly losing his patience with the entire turn the night has taken, Matt decides to try to wrestle the men into submission. He grabs the wrist of the one to his right the next time the man attempts a jab and twists his grip around until he has advantage. He spins the man one hundred eighty degrees and forces him to his knees by kicking the back of his calves, pinning his arm behind his back. Meanwhile, the man two interprets this as an opportunity to attempt a sneak attack on his disadvantaged opponent. But Matt is not about to sit back and watch that happen. He slides his hand up the man’s chest and pops him in the jaw- not hard enough to cause damage, but with enough force to startle and disorient. This buys Matt a few moments to turn back to the man one. With only his ingenuity and his own suit at his disposal, Matt rigs a hog-tie with his billy-club to subdue the man and even his odds a bit more. But that uneasy feeling Matt had before comes back three-fold when he does a quick scan and finds that the man’s pulse is erratic as he continues to thrash against the restraints, muttering under his breath in that same hollow voice, “must fight… can’t stop” even as the wire begins to chafe and break the skin of his wrists.

The sound of shoes shuffling on pavement alerts Matt to the fact that man two is back on his feet. Matt stands and cocks his head, surveying the scene before him. Reading the man’s momentum and probable trajectory allows him to anticipate the necessary moments to dance around the man’s clumsy, if powerful strikes in his direction. But after Matt dodges out of the way of the man’s initial advances, pivoting on the ball of his foot to put himself and the man in the exact opposite positions which they had inhabited moments before, Matt is surprised. He expects the man to turn and pivot as well, to come at him again, going low so that Matt has already planned to go high. 

But the man doesn’t turn to fight him again. Instead, he continues forward, stumbling to where his opponent lies prone and helpless on the ground. And before Matt can register what is happening, the man raises his foot and kicks at the trapped man’s ribs without so much as a heartbeat’s hesitation.

Matt stands stock still, mouth gaping in dumbfounded awe for a beat before shaking himself into action. He rushes to man two where he stands above man one, now unconscious on the ground. Leaning back and lifting his right leg, Matt lands a solid kick in the center of man two’s back. It isn’t quite enough to interrupt the man’s focus (that creepy, obsessive drive is in full swing) but it does make him lose his balance, and that’s all the opening Matt needs. A punch to the kidney causes the man to double over, and with that, Matt wraps his arms around his neck, squeezing just hard enough to knock him out for the time being. The man fights back with a surprising amount of strength, but Matt feels it leaving the man little by little as the seconds of his hold tick by. He can hear the man’s heart slowing and feel the tension starting to leave his frame when a sound from behind him surprises him and reminds him of the fact that he’s had an audience for this entire performance. 

A smattering of applause cuts through the silence of the alley, reverberating off of the brick and concrete tunnel surrounding them. It sets Matt’s teeth on edge because it sounds distinctly patronizing as far as clapping goes. That doesn’t bode well for what kind of person the man must be. Then the man speaks, and any concern or negative feelings Matt had moments before melts away. 

“Well, well. What a show! And how fortuitous that I should have been here at this exact moment to witness such feats of heroism,” the well-dressed man says in a smooth, British drawl that is infectious with its giddiness. Matt starts when he hears the voice because it wouldn’t have necessarily been his first pick for the voice he imagined for the man, but he supposes it fits as well as any other voice he could have envisioned. “But now that’s quite enough of that,” the man speaks again, motioning in Matt’s direction with a casual flick of his wrist. 

Suddenly bored of his task, Matt drops his arms from where he previously held them around man two’s neck causing him to slump to the ground like a toy whose batteries have gone dead. The British man then gestures to man two where he sits, hunched on the ground. “Oy, you- you’re done here. Go home.” 

A half-beat passes while the man appears to consider the directive; then he staggers to his feet, and takes off down the alleyway, shuffling toward, what Matt can only assume, is his home. For a moment Matt worries about the man’s health, but then decides if he can walk in the direction of his home, he can get access to as much help as Matt would be able to provide to him. Rather than worry any more about the retreating form of man two, he turns toward a still unconscious man one, where he lies in a heap several paces back. For the benefit of his audience, he makes a show of checking the man’s pulse after untying the restraints and retrieving his billy club; he’s been monitoring the man’s vitals since man two used him as a human soccer ball. From what Matt can tell, there’s no life-threatening damage, thank God. He can hear that the man has a fractured rib which will hurt like hell come morning, but there doesn’t appear to be any internal bleeding or organ damage. So that’s something. Matt goes to make one last show of checking the man’s breathing when the British man walks up behind him, interrupting his thoughts. 

“My, my, how noble of you, playing nurse. But you don’t need to do that, he’ll be fine,” he says with a shrug and an overly reassuring smile. 

And just then it occurs to Matt, this man _will_ be fine. Besides, what could he do for him now, anyway? He stands, securing his billy-club to his utility belt, and the British man lets out a low whistle. 

“That’s quite an outfit. Don’t tell me I’ve missed Halloween already,” he says in a voice just shy of haughty, and Matt would bet that the man is scrutinizing him because he suddenly feels the weight of his stare.

A tense beat passes in which Matt can do nothing but chew on his lip. Because it’s _January_ and technically the man has missed Halloween by quite a fair margin, but the sarcasm in the man’s tone tells Matt he’s well aware of that fact and doesn’t need to be reminded.

Sighing, the man realizes his mistake and speaks again. “Well, being that it isn’t Halloween and you, apparently, have the sense of humor of a wet rag, allow me to clarify. What possessed you to wear all that?”

“I wear this for protection,” Matt says, surprised at his own candor in the face of a conversation that is veering toward mockery in a staggeringly short amount of time. 

“Hmm, protection from what, exactly?” That seems to have been a correct answer of sorts as it causes the man to pause and cock his head at Matt.

“From harm,” Matt says with a shrug. 

“Yes, well, perhaps I still wasn’t being specific enough,” the man mutters under his breath. “Harm from what?” he asks, then a moment later adds,” Or from whom?” in an annoyed tone.

For reasons he cannot begin to fathom, Matt doesn’t try nearly hard enough not to answer the man’s questions. He is equal parts baffled and horrified when the words begin to pour out of his mouth, even as some part of his conscious brain screams at him to stop. “From the people I fight. Mostly criminals. Occasionally other ‘gifted’ individuals.” The man’s entire body language shifts when he hears the word “gifted” leave Matt’s mouth. He goes deathly still, standing at attention, completely engrossed in every syllable.

“‘ _Other_ gifted individuals’ you say? Well…” he says, drawing out the word as though savoring it like a five course meal. Matt imagines a mischievous glint in his eye to match the sound. “That could imply a few things, couldn’t it? One being that you are one as well, and two being that you know of additional people with ‘gifts’. So which is it?” 

“I don’t personally know anyone else who has ‘gifts’ or abilities,” Matt says, in the most lawyerly response he can manage while still answering the man’s question. But he’s still being way more open and honest than he has any right to be talking to this total stranger and he can’t seem to get his brain to remember that for long enough to stop.

“Right, it’s the first one then. So what all can you do?” the man asks, voice raising in a skeptical tone.

“My senses are significantly enhanced- scent, taste, touch, hearing. I can sense things, impossible things like heart beats through walls or floors of buildings, specific voices from blocks away, or the path of a bullet based on the change in temperature of the air around it.”

The man blinks, surprised, but nods his head a few times, considering. “What about sight? You didn’t mention that. Is that enhanced, too?”

“No.” 

“And why not?” the man asks with an air of petulance, as though personally offended by Matt’s answer.

“Because I’m blind,” Matt says with a shrug and a flat, matter of fact tone.

This catches the man’s attention again. “What? _Really_? Come here,” he says and waggles his index finger, beckoning Matt over.

Matt tries to resist, to fight the compulsion driving him to comply, he _really_ does, but it’s as if he’s being controlled remotely and this man holds the controls. The desire builds subtly, like a fog. But as it rolls into his mind and down his spine, it wraps around his ankles. And then his feet move of their own volition, leading him to stand in front of the man. 

“Take off your mask.”

An icy chill of terror runs down Matt’s spine and his fingers twitch with the exertion of holding in place at his side. Because he does not truly want to do as the man says. He knows all of the myriad reasons he shouldn’t, all of the million things that could go wrong if he does. After all, he’s spent nearly a year hiding his identity, guarding it with his life. He’s made sacrifices in the name of his mask, for all the good it’s done him- choices that have come at the expense of his mental health, his relationships, and occasionally at the expense of his career. He will be damned if he will throw that all away at the behest of a stranger he has known for less than thirty minutes. 

And yet… 

In this instant, he suddenly has one singular desire in all of the world— to take off his mask. Consequences be damned, he just wants to take it off, and he has never wanted anything more. The fog which guided his steps grows thicker now, rising up from his ankles to wreath around his knees, then up to his torso and the tips of his fingers, threading between them and threatening to move his hand any moment. It’s clouding out his own thoughts, replacing them with one simple, repeating notion— _I want to take off my mask._

A far-off corner of his mind observes the transformation with abject horror, watching this impostor of himself inhabit his mind and his skin and control his body like a marionette. But this part of him is helpless to do anything but scream and thrash against the invisible box it’s trapped inside- a powerless bystander watching while a train crashes in slow motion.

Matt reaches up and removes the mask, all concern about his actions forgotten or locked far away in the back of his head. He trains his eyes to where he guesses would be an approximation of the man’s gaze. The man waves a hand in front of Matt and steps closer to check his pupils. Once satisfied that his pupils will not dilate or track, the man huffs in surprise.

“Blimey, you are. So let’s do a little test, shall we? What all can you sense right now with those abilities of yours?”

“Well, I can sense _a lot_ of things right now including but not limited to: what you last ate— Duck à l'orange, I believe; the current score of the Knick’s game— 46-38 and they’re up at the half, if you’ve got any money riding on the game; or the number of people in the buildings on this block …” he hesitates for a moment, counting. “372, by the way. Though someone just stepped out to get some Chinese food. Where do you want me to start? Or do you truly want me to list _everything?”_

“Oh, cheeky one you are. But that can be forgiven, considering what remarkable skills you have to offer. Even more than … her. And undeniably more useful, seeing as you can also fight,” the man says in a contemplative tone. He is silent for a beat, deep in thought with his thumb under his chin and his index finger over his top lip. Matt stands still and silent, a soldier awaiting his next order. But he doesn’t have to wait long.

“You’ve demonstrated more than enough for the time being, but tell me something— what is the range of your powers?” 

Matt hesitates for a moment, biting his lip. “I don’t actually know. I’ve never tested myself to find the limits of each. Hearing probably has the longest range. And if I’m really concentrating and blocking everything else out, I can sense things from … a far distance away. Multiple blocks, for sure. Maybe a mile or more if I had something specific to listen for.”

The man hums in delight and clasps a hand on Matt’s shoulder. “I’m certain we can make that work. Now tell me, what’s your name?”

“Matthew Murdock,” he says in a calm, even voice that belies the panic he feels in that distant corner of his mind. Because any shred of anonymity he had hoped to retain in this demented encounter disintegrates like ash on the wind as those four syllables leave his lips.

“Brilliant. Always a fan of alliteration. And what do you do, Matthew Murdock?” 

“I’m a lawyer.” 

“Of course you are. That explains quite a lot, actually. Few people I … _instruct_ are ever so pedantic when it comes to my word choice. But if I must, I’ll try to be more specific.” The man steps back and looks him up and down, chin bobbing as he does some kind of assessment. “But I almost forgot to ask; what’s this all about?” he gestures toward Matt with his index finger and waggles it up and down, as if to indicate his whole ensemble. 

“What do you mean?” Matt asks, genuinely confused about what the man is asking. He thought they’d covered this already—

“I mean, you’ve got the belt and that club and the suit along with that hideous mask to hide your face. So what are you? A hero? One of those caped— or rather masked— crusaders, traipsing around the city and dispensing vigilante justice?

Matt blinks but because that isn’t what he expects the man to say, but he supposes it isn’t far off from the truth when he puts it that way. He can only shrug and nod in agreement. 

“So what’s your name?” the man asks, lifting his chin in Matt’s direction.

Matt furrows his brows and frowns. Is it just him or does this man like to talk in circles? “Matt—” 

“No, no, I mean your hero name?” the man asks in a voice that sounds genuinely excited to know. Matt feels some strange sense of pride at that.

“Well, I don’t know. I didn’t personally choose one. But the paper has been calling me ‘The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen’ recently,” he says with a half shrug. 

The man gives a devious chuckle. “‘The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen’. Oh, I like that. That will do quite nicely.” A beat passes and the man looks up at Matt, as if having remembered something. “Where are my manners? How terribly rude. I’m Kilgrave, by the way,” he says as he offers Matt his hand.

Matt takes it and shakes it in his most professional, lawyerly grip. “It’s nice to meet you, Kilgrave.”

“Oh, believe me, the pleasure is entirely mine,” Kilgrave says with a chuckle in his voice, as though laughing at a private joke Matt doesn’t understand. Then, he pulls up the sleeve of his jacket and checks his watch. “Well, I’m famished and could do for some steak. I know just the place— you’ll love it,” he says over his shoulder, as he turns on his heel and starts off toward the mouth of the alley. 

Matt wholeheartedly trusts that he absolutely will love the steak, even if he generally isn’t a big steak fan. He starts off after Kilgrave without a conscious thought about it.

“It’s my meal of choice when hatching a plot to torture the former love of my life- but I’m getting ahead of myself, my apologies. I’ll get you up to speed and tell you everything you need to know about that- the history between us and how you factor into my grand scheme, all of it. But for now, I want to focus on learning more about you. Your abilities are fascinating after all, and I just have to know everything about them. And you.” 

They exit the alley onto the sidewalk at the exact same time that another well-dressed man with a briefcase is stepping out of a car in front of the building to their right. Matt can’t tell the exact make and model, but he can tell that it’s luxury and expensive due to the sound of the engine and the smell of the leather interior before the man shuts the door. 

Kilgrave crosses over to the man, hands in his pockets and whistling low. “Nice car you’ve got there. You’d like to let me borrow it indefinitely and you’ll act as my chauffeur.” 

The man turns to Kilgrave with an incredulous look that slowly morphs into one of agreement. “Absolutely, sir. Where would you like to go?” he asks as he opens the back door and gestures for Kilgrave to get in. 

He turns back to Matt, standing a few feet behind on the sidewalk and ushers him forward. “Come on, then. Did you think we were going to walk? And you might as well put that mask back on— at least until we’re able to get you some suitable clothes for non-hero activities. I wouldn’t want to ruin the secret of your identity. You never know what advantages might come in handy.” 

At the suggestion from Kilgrave, Matt remembers the mask he’s been so cavalierly holding. He turns it over in his hands once, fingers feeling the textures and grooves, remembering what it signifies, who he is with and without it. He slips it back over his head. The still-sane voice in the far-off corner of his mind surfaces at the feeling of the familiar weight on his face. He raises his head and observes Kilgrave standing next to the car, arm outstretched and inviting him inside.

Matt knows he cannot resist. He already feels the fog rolling in, building behind his eyes, filling his head, floating down his spine and sparking his nerves to start moving forward. But he’s hopeful that if he can hold onto his mask, it can act as an anchor for him, and help him remember who he is, despite the strange siren call of Kilgrave’s voice.

He walks forward— headfirst into the fog— and steps into the back seat. Kilgrave ushers him in, following behind and all the while raving about the dinner that awaits them.

Matt all but tunes him out, giving him the most minimal level of attention and using all of the willpower that he can muster to keep from losing himself completely to the man’s control until the man demands otherwise. He knows it’s a losing battle but he pledges to fight it for as long as he can because even if he doesn’t know exactly what Kilgrave has planned for him after dinner, he has a suspicion that it is nothing good.

\----

As it turns out, “nothing good” is an understatement when it comes to describing the next few weeks. Despite his best efforts, he cannot break free from the hold of Kilgrave’s control over his mind. He simply cannot clear the fog of Kilgrave’s desires or remember his own long enough to actually act on them. There are glimmers, tiny reflections of his own thoughts that catch his mind’s eye from time to time, and he grasps onto them with a dying man’s grip— desperate and clawing. But it’s never quite enough. They shine bright for a moment, taunting him and building up his hopes, only to inevitably slip away into the haze leaving Matt unmoored, halfway down a disappearing path, obscured by the murkiness of someone else’s thoughts. 

And those thoughts and desires compel him to do truly awful things. Matt considers himself to be a generally good, just man. He is intentional about the people that he fights, and he has limits to the amount of violence he will inflict upon them. Though he has struggled at times with the morality of his mask, he has agonized over the fact that he would not take a man's life, even when he knew it would be easier to kill him than to attempt to bring him to justice the proper way. He never, in a million years imagined he would be capable of hurting innocent people for no reason at all. And before Kilgrave, he wouldn't have. But now, he's lucky if he only has to minorly inconvenience someone, let alone hurt them in some way while running errands for Kilgrave and carrying out his sinister plans. He only prays that he will not be asked to kill someone under his control, because he does not know if he would be strong enough to fight the command, and the thought makes him sick with disgust— both at himself, and at the sociopath that has put him in this position to begin with.

And then there's the sick plan that Kilgrave is concocting for the poor woman he claims literally threw him under a bus some many months ago. Matt has pieced together bits and pieces of the story of their relationship and Kilgrave’s twisted infatuation with her throughout the myriad tasks he’s been given to complete. The picture he’s assembled is a peculiar one. Jessica Jones is her name. She is, among other things, a private investigator, a borderline alcoholic, and a bitter, brash woman with a caustic, biting wit. At times he catches himself wishing he could meet her because she sounds like a fascinating woman, but then he thinks better of the idea as he considers what kind of hand-print Kilgrave’s influence may have left on her life and how that may have changed her, morphed her personality into some phantom version of who she used to be. The rare times he dreams recently (when he’s even allowed to sleep), his dreams always seem to devolve into some version of a nightmare scenario in which his subconscious reflects on the realities of that inevitability for him someday. He always wakes in a cold sweat, conscious mind slipping away back into its corner, screaming at him to remember and to run while that Kilgrave-heavy fog rolls in behind it so that he cannot remember anything of the dream, save for an ephemeral, uneasy feeling of disconnectedness and losing himself. And in some ways, he’s almost happy for the first order he receives on those days because it reminds him that he’s well and truly caught and that he cannot escape this sadistic man’s grasp on his own.

For Kilgrave seems all too delighted to have found someone with Matt’s abilities. He mentions just about every other day that Matt is the “perfect assistant” for him. A far-off and timid voice in the back of Matt’s head that still understands irony quips that the word “assistant” would imply a host of benefits not currently afforded to him, chief among them being bodily autonomy and control over one’s own mind. But maybe he’s just being _pedantic_ again. 

Still, being one’s own personal lawyer who just so happens to be trained in multiple fighting styles and has heightened senses really is the ideal assistant because Matt can do just about anything that Kilgrave needs done, with or without Kilgrave there to provide extra motivation (a.k.a. mind-control) to whomever he’s dealing with. And most convenient of all, he can go as long as needed between face-to-face meetings. Because as it turns out, Matt can hear Kilgrave from a remarkable distance away— up to several miles if the conditions are right, meaning he is concentrating on nothing else but the specific sound of his voice and knows the general area where he should be listening. Matt has sneaking suspicion this is the reason that Kilgrave has continued to keep him around for the last few weeks where he would have long grown bored and discarded him in other circumstances, content to move on to the next unsuspecting victim, using them until it was no longer necessary or convenient to do so, and repeating the cycle ad infinitum. 

Even though Kilgrave refuses to release him, the rest of the cycle repeats in an endless, Groundhog Day-style loop for several weeks. Matt gets up, checks in, does Kilgrave’s bidding for the day, checks in with him again exactly twelve hours after the most recent command (unless told to do so earlier), and does whatever other tasks that are assigned to him. Occasionally, he will be asked to dine with Kilgrave or accompany him on specific trips and tasks of various intent, and during this time Matt will be asked to recount his progress toward his tasks. But there are certain times, rare as they may be, when something stranger will happen. Times when Kilgrave will desire to act like a normal, unsuspecting member of society who does things like going to a sports game or playing in a poker match. These would not be strange or remarkable occurrences for any normal person who might wish to do such activities with a friend- but as one might imagine, Kilgrave has none. And as a result, he will force Matt to play the part, along the way causing him to laugh at his jokes and compliment him, playing up his ego in a terrible show of how fragile and insecure it really is. 

Matt always feels a terrible sense of dread in those times, for the sense of violation is somehow so much stronger than when simply asked to do things he had not considered doing. Being asked to feel something he had not previously felt seems even more disgusting, a more obvious betrayal of one’s own body and mind. He cannot bear to think on it too long, but it only makes his heart break for Jessica Jones that much more when he considers what other violations she might have endured under Kilgrave’s control. He prays that the subject never comes up with Kilgrave, because it’s really no wonder why she ran at the first opportunity. There aren’t many chances for him to consider his own getaway plan with the perpetual struggle to see through the haze of Kilgrave’s control and find his way back to his own sense of self, but whenever he gets the slightest chance, Matt begins to focus his energy on crafting his own escape.

\----

In a surprising twist of fate, he has to wait a much shorter time than he originally anticipated to attempt his own escape, though the circumstances are much stranger than anything he could have foreseen. It starts out as a normal Sunday; Matt gets up, goes to work doing errands for Kilgrave while also masquerading as Matt Murdock, attorney at law and friend to Foggy & Karen. Pretending, as he has for several weeks, that things are fine and that he is completely himself- not a hollow, zombie version being controlled like a marionette by a sadistic sociopath. With poker faces to rival Matt’s own, Foggy and Karen simply smile and nod at him, aware something is off but unclear of exactly what and unwilling for now to push for more details. That far distant voice in the back corner of his mind wrestles with this truth and how he will have to one day reckon with it before the edges of his thoughts get fuzzy and murky, shifting back into compulsions from his own free creations. And he muses for a fleeting moment that he will first have to escape Kilgrave before it is anything more than a hypothetical thought experiment anyway. And then the thought is gone, evaporating like the morning mist at the first break of day. 

Matt goes about his business, preparing to leave his apartment for a “brunch meeting with a potential new client” at ten fifteen. Nevermind that the client is Kilgrave and he isn’t a client at all. Rather, it is an excuse for Matt to meet with him face-to-face. They haven’t seen one another in almost 48 hours now, which is pushing it as far as the limits of their in-person interaction. The last few times they have spoken, on the phone or via the strange, not quite long-range telepathic capabilities which Matt possesses, Kilgrave’s voice has sounded especially sharp and anxious. He has made great pains to create a fantastic story about how he is closing in on Jessica, though by the sounds of it, she may actually be closing in on _him_. As a result, Matt suspects that the plan Kilgrave has been crafting for her is about to shift into a higher gear. He shudders to think what that might mean for the both of them. 

Not wanting to be late, Matt takes off early, giving himself plenty of time to arrive at the outdoor cafe at 16th St and Union Square West where he was instructed to meet with Kilgrave via text only moments before. He finds himself arriving in the area just a few minutes after ten o’clock. As he crosses through the park across the street from the cafe, he notices Kilgrave right away, picking out his cologne and the scent of his fine leather shoes from nearly half a block away. The scents are so specific to him now, so ingrained that he would know them anywhere, and he feels his heart-rate accelerate in an automatic, Pavlovian response. Even if (most of) his conscious mind doesn’t fear him anymore, his body certainly still does. Taking a deep grounding breath, he finds a park bench close to the edge of the block where he can keep a good “eye” on Kilgrave and the cafe. Then he takes a moment to calm himself down before their meeting.

Matt has to wait his turn, anyway. After taking a few breaths and slowing his heart rate down again, he turns his senses back to Kilgrave where he sits at a table left of the cafe entrance and notices he is not sitting alone. Matt pauses as he evaluates the other person at the table— a young male, and a junkie by the smell of it. Matt realizes this must be the mole. The informant. The spy. Malcolm, he thinks he once heard his name to be. And what a job it must be, spying on a private detective with super abilities for drug money, and all at the deranged request of someone like Kilgrave. Matt’s stomach lurches with disgust and pity for Jessica Jones, this woman he has never met, and has by now decided to pray he never will.

A balloon pops at the balloon artist’s stand at the corner of the block, just a few feet down from where Kilgrave sits for his meeting. The sound rings through the art with the same punch as a gunshot, and Matt notices Kilgrave tense in response. Matt goes into fight or flight mode automatically, assessing the nearby area for potential threats. He’s able to write off the balloon for the fluke that it is, but as he continues to scan the area, he notices something else quite interesting. A man is moving in on Kilgrave’s position, and he is concealing a gun. But it doesn’t smell like it’s carrying real gunpower. In fact it smells chemical. Could it be something as simple as a tranquilizer dart? Kilgrave seems to notice something is wrong also, even if he can’t pinpoint the source of the threat. Just as Matt is about to get up and investigate, possibly joining the fray to fight if necessary, he notices a woman in his periphery. She walks to the edge of the block from where she had been crossing the park and lingering idly by a hot dog stand moments before. When she comes to stand directly across from the cafe, she stands up to her full height, having previously hunched over to deflect attention to herself, and raises her hands into the air screaming, “Hey, shithead! Over here!” directly at Kilgrave. As soon as he hears the woman’s words, it’s as if she had shot him herself.

Instantly, Matt knows this is Jessica Jones. No one else could make the man freeze as he does then or cause the rush of adrenaline and corticosteroids which Matt senses immediately in his body as she stares him down across the street. And the span of a heart-beat that it takes for Kilgrave to notice her and freeze, and for Matt to realize what is happening, then hesitate in uncertainty is all the time that is needed for the man with the dart gun to walk the few steps up to Kilgrave and shoot him, point blank in the neck.

Chaos erupts, both in the world around him and in his internal world, in that moment. A nagging compulsion that wakes like a slumbering dragon from somewhere inside the hazy depths of control inside of Matt’s mind tells him to defend Kilgrave and ensure his safety, to fight the man who shot him— to the death if necessary. Another voice, however, from deep inside the corner of his own subconscious, in a voice he fleeting recognizes as his own, tells him something else, however. It tells him not to listen to the voice of control from Kilgrave and to fight the compulsion. Instead, it says to fight the pull of gravity which seems to drag him forward, to think hard and will away the fog, to remember his freedom and his autonomy which is drawing nearer and clearer with each second that passes. Battling confusion and disorientation the likes of which he has never before experienced, Matt shifts his focus back to Kilgrave, listening hard to his vitals. He is thrilled to hear his heart slowing, and his breathing growing shallow as he struggles to his feet, staggering with the effort. Tranquilizer dart, indeed, and hallelujah for that. He isn’t dead, but he is decidedly unconscious by the time he hits the ground a beat later. 

And Matt suddenly feels a lightness, an absence of pressure where he had previously felt such a suffocating weight which had become so familiar as to be an imperceptible part of his being. The fog in his brain lightens and dissipates, allowing his focus to return and his own thoughts to filter back in, all in the vacuum of space created by the evacuation of Kilgrave’s ever shrinking presence in his head. It’s the mental equivalent of his ears popping due to a change in air pressure. The change is so staggering that it steals Matt’s breath while he continues to shake off the vestiges of the phantom hands of Kilgrave’s control. Unfortunately for Matt, that’s time enough for Jessica to cross the street and pick up the now unconscious Kilgrave and take off with him down the street. 

Realizing this is his chance— likely his _only_ chance, the moment for which he has prayed which would let him escape— Matt hesitates for one more breath. Because he would love nothing more than to get into a cab and put as great a distance between himself and that man as the laws of physics would allow, but Jessica Jones’s presence here today was a twist for which he could not have accounted. And now a part of him is insanely curious about what, exactly, she plans to do with Kilgrave. She clearly had a well-thought out plan for how to capture him. What else could she have devised for what comes next? And does she have any possible hope to carry it out?

Licking his lips while he considers all the thousands of reasons why he is a complete and total idiot and is making the worst mistake of his life, Matt stands, picking up his cane and takes off down the south side of the street, trailing Jessica with his senses. When she walked by him on her way to distract Kilgrave, he had noticed the scent of whiskey, leather, and hints of coffee; it’s that specific perfume that he tracks now as fast as his cane and glasses will allow him to go, as she moves south toward the corner on the north side of the street. He is about to catch up and cross the street when she comes up to a waiting passenger van and dumps Kilgrave inside, with the help of the man who had shot him with the tranquilizer dart. Jessica piles into the back while the man hops into the front seat, and Matt flags down a cab as fast as he can (occasionally people will take pity on him for his blindness, and this is one instance in which he does not mind as he normally might). When the driver asks where he wants to go, he tells him to follow the van ahead of them, and blessedly, the man doesn’t think too hard about how Matt happens to know that. 

For a brief moment Matt begins to sweat when he notices other cars in pursuit of the van directly ahead of them. But then Matt recalls that Kilgrave had mentioned something about getting some extra security to follow him around due to the fact that he was not always with him while doing errands and such, and Matt relaxes a fraction. His anxiety returns, however, when the driver loses the van and the cars for a solid few minutes, putting serious distance between them. In the end, Matt asks the driver to let him out in an industrial park near the East River, because it’s where the trail goes cold, and seems the most logical choice of a hiding place. Matt decides to go the rest of the way on foot. He only wishes he’d brought his suit as he feels it would be infinitely more useful for him to be Daredevil right now, instead of Matt Murdock. 

Due to the fact that it’s Sunday, the area is deserted. Matt is grateful for that and does not do much of any masking as he hurries down the drive lined with various industrial buildings. He picks up his pace and says a silent prayer of thanks that he chose the correct direction when he hears the sounds of a fight ensuing past the entrance of the building just north of his current position, where he also registers the scent of both Jessica and Kilgrave. Sneaking around the corner of the building and working his way up to the fight, he observes that the security detail has unfortunately caught up to Jessica and her crew, and is in the process of attempting to beat them down. But they are putting up one hell of a fight. 

Like the ninja he was trained to be, Matt sneaks up behind the closest guard, where he and three of his buddies are taking cattle prods to Jessica’s sides, and kicks him in the back of the knees before bringing his forearm down on the man’s wrist and knocking the cattle prod free. He picks it up and plunges it into the man’s stomach, eliciting a yelp as the man’s muscles clench, seize, then go limp, sending him to the ground in a heap. Having noticed a new player in the arena, all three of the men pause to look up at Matt while one of them turns to face off with him. The other two continue to fight Jessica, who is currently too busy defending herself to be surprised or question who Matt is or why he’s here. 

Matt dances around the other man’s attacks, using the cattle prod to keep a healthy distance between them, and catching the man between the ribs when he loses his balance because of a series of steps and attacks Matt makes in quick succession. When the second man goes down with a yelp, Jessica looks his way, having finally noticed something in the balance of the fight has changed. “What the fu—”she starts, but isn’t able to finish her thought as the men coming for her continue to fight. And then all of a sudden, there is another man coming from the other side of the van to fight him. Matt dodges him as best he can, throwing punches and kicks and attempting to shock him to no avail. He is trying to take stock of the chaos around him, but the buzzing of the cattle prods is crackling like static in the back of his mind and the charge of electricity creates a strange hum in the air, making just enough white noise that he has to concentrate a little harder to determine where each kick and punch will come from a second or too later than he should.

Just as the crackling and buzzing starts to build to a fever pitch, itching under his skin, a second man comes from somewhere behind the van with Kilgrave over his shoulder. The presence of the man who has caused Matt such suffering over the past month, incapacitated or not, makes Matt hesitate. And it’s just long enough that one of the men fighting Jessica turns and flails in an attempt to escape her attacks, causing him to shove an errant cattle prod directly into Matt’s back. The electric current burns through the fabric of his jacket and his shirt, searing through his skin and his muscles like a fire-bolt. It connects with his spine, jolting him like a jackhammer, while the electric charge volts down up and down his central nervous system like a firework, exploding behind his eyes in pain. Matt tries in vain to fight the urge of his muscles to constrict, but the signals of pain being sent to his brain are too much for him to overcome. He convulses in agony, a prisoner of his body’s whims as it writhes and he loses consciousness.

-

Awareness returns to Matt in a slow trickle a short time later, but once it has, his first conscious thought is of Kilgrave and the blessed lack of control he has over Matt. The second thought is of where Kilgrave could have escaped in the short time he’s been unconscious. Matt then becomes aware of his immediate surroundings, registering a presence above him. Guessing by the scent of whiskey and leather he catches off of the person, he’s guessing it’s none other than Jessica Jones herself. Matt stands up and dusts himself off, then rubs the bridge of his nose in an attempt to stop what he can already tell is ramping up to be a raging migraine. 

Jessica simply stands watching him, arms crossed, tone dripping with a mix of confusion and disdain. “So, Sleeping Beauty finally rouses. Who the hell are you, by the way? You’ve got a mean right hook but I missed the part when you explained where you came from and why you were even here in the first place.” 

She stares him down, and Matt grows uneasy under the intensity of her gaze. But he has questions of his own, which all involve Kilgrave and the limited amount of time which he may remain unconscious. “Listen, I’m happy to tell you all about myself, but first please tell me you’ve got a plan for Kilgrave. Like, what did you use to knock him out and how long is he going to be unconscious? And where is he now?” Matt fires off in rapid fire fashion while trying not to sound desperate.

Though he didn’t answer her question, it must have been answer enough because her entire demeanor shifts, softening a few degrees from her previously rigid posture. “You said Kilgrave? What do you know about him? Is that why you’re here?” she asks. 

Matt sighs, trying to decide how best to condense his story for an introduction in the limited time they have to spare. “For now, let’s just say I’m intimately acquainted with his specific ‘abilities’ and I’m willing to help anyone who’s trying to keep him from being able to hurt anyone else.” He doesn’t realize how true the words are until they are out of his mouth, but once he hears himself say them, they galvanize him in his purpose. A shiver runs down his spine at the reminder of the control he was subject to not even twelve hours earlier, and he shakes his head to clear it.

Jessica seems to react in tandem, a sympathetic reaction, as though reading his mind. Perhaps it would be more likely that she is lost in a haze of her own terrible memories of his control. Regardless, she hesitates for a moment then offers her hand to him. “Jessica. Jones. And at this point I’m the default president of the ‘Take Kilgrave down to save the world club’. So welcome aboard, I guess” she says, with a healthy dose of sarcasm lacing her tone.

Matt gives her a crooked, smirk of a smile, and offers her his hand in return. “Well then, Matt Murdock, reporting for duty. So, what’s next? Where is he and how long do we have?” he asks, unable to keep an edge of anxiety from creeping into his voice.

Jessica licks her lips and looks down. “He got away for now, despite our best efforts. But ex-commando boy Simpson over there caught one of his security guys before he could escape and plans to do some questioning to figure out where he might be going next. With that information, we’ll be able to figure out our next steps of the plan and try the tranquilizer again. There’s a hermetically sealed room here in a decommissioned CDC facility that he’s set up to keep Kilgrave captive. That was where we had hoped to bring him.”

“That’s a great plan, actually. But uh— the questioning of the security guard? That might not be entirely necessary,” Matt says, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. 

Jessica cocks her head at him, and he imagines she cocks an eyebrow to match by the tone she uses. “What do you know and how do you know it?” she asks, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “And do I even really want to know the answer to that question?” she adds, mumbling to herself under her breath in a voice soft enough that he would have not heard her without his abilities. 

Movement around the van interrupts their conversation. “Jess, let’s go!” calls a woman leaning through the window of the driver’s seat of the van. Jessica looks back over her shoulder at the woman. “Just a sec, Trish!” she yells back in response. Shifting back and forth on her feet, she considers Matt for a moment, then blows out a labored breath. 

“Look, do you want a ride back downtown?” she says at the same moment that Matt asks “I’m sorry to overstep, but can I come with you?” 

Realizing they had the same thought, they chuckle and start walking toward the van. Simpson gets into the front passenger seat while Jessica and Matt pile into the back with the captive- still unconscious for now. On the ride, Jessica continues to give more backstory about their plan, and how it went wrong, as well as a rough outline of the rest of the plan when they eventually capture Kilgrave again, and her eventual hope to have him locked up in some supermax prison for his crimes. Particularly those perpetrated against the young woman who recently killed her parents. Hope Schlottman, he thinks, is her name. Matt is particularly interested in learning about the process they used to drug him, and her best estimates of how long the effects will last.

“So it’s sufentanil? A surgical grade anesthetic and with the dosage you used, you would guess he could be out for anywhere from twelve to sixteen hours?” Matt asks, taking mental notes and committing them to memory so he can ask Claire about it at the first possible opportunity.

“Yeah,” she says with a wary tone and what Matt guesses is a side-long glance. “Please don’t tell me you’re planning to try to capture and drug him like that yourself. We don’t need any one-man hero-shows here, okay? That’s how people end up dead, and I’m really fucking tired up of that,” she spits, shaking her head. Matt can feel the fury, the loss, and agony seeping from her pores as she speaks and it makes him pause. He had been planning to do _exactly_ as she said, but has suddenly realized a major flaw in his plan. Matt knows Jessica is correct. The trouble is, if Kilgrave regains consciousness before they are able to capture and drug him again, Matt will be at risk of being subject to his control wherever in the city he might be, if it’s close enough for him to hear Kilgrave’s voice. So unless he wants to wear noise canceling headphones for the foreseeable future (possibly even the rest of his life), rendering him deaf as well as blind, Matt needs to pause and reconsider his plan. 

Appropriately chastised, Matt drops his head. “You’re right, I’m sorry. I uh… Just… would like to be looped into whatever plan you put together in the future. Considering that I’ve been under his control for the last month, acting as an extension of his right hand, going with him just about everywhere, I feel I have some useful input to contribute,” he offers, lamely, afraid to say what he really means. He’s only known her about an hour at this point, but for some ridiculous reason, has a feeling he can trust Jessica; however, there are two other people in this van (technically three, depending if the security guard is conscious) and Matt certainly does not feel comfortable sharing his abilities in front of them.

Intuitive as she is, Jessica senses he is holding back something, though chooses not to push him on it for the moment. Instead, she half shrugs at him. “Sure, why not?” she says with false cheer in her voice. “But we’ve got to catch him first. Which we could also use your help with,” she snarks. 

Matt scoffs. “Lucky for you, my calendar just cleared up,” he says and smiles as Jessica huffs under her breath.

And that is how he comes to find himself at Alias Investigations, the one and only office of Jessica Jones, some thirty minutes later. With the security guard released and Simpson and Trish gone home, awaiting updates while Jess and Matt work to piece together a rough sketch of Kilgrave’s next possible moves, Matt finally feels comfortable enough to share his experiences. 

Jessica listens silently while he recounts his situation and the finer points of being Kilgrave’s puppet for the last month, watching him from across her desk, feet propped up and sipping from a bottle of whiskey periodically. She pauses for a moment when he finishes, thinking and chewing her lip. “That’s all fine and good, but why did he pick you in the first place? No offense, but I’ve never seen Kilgrave maintain interest in someone for that period of time unless they brought something … _extra_ to the table. He told you plenty about me, so you know I have abilities. So what’s your deal?” 

Matt clears his throat and takes a deep breath, fighting down the anxiety that he feels at the prospect of sharing his greatest secret with yet a fifth person. But he already knows so much about her, and somehow he instinctively knows she will guard his truth as protectively as he has. 

“Well, don’t let these ridiculously fashionable glasses fool you. I may be blind, but it just so happens that all of the rest of my senses are heightened, allowing me to function in nearly all ways that sighted people can.”

“Just how heightened?” Jessica asks, voice level and full of skepticism. 

Matt shrugs. “Enough that I can get around without the cane- which I use purely for show- and fight people by noticing the air moving around them. But cattle prods mess with my equilibrium a little, apparently. But I can still smell the pizza that you ate for breakfast and spilled on your shirt. Supreme, I believe it was. And I can hear that there are nine people on the floor beneath us, simply by listening for their heartbeats.” 

Jessica swings her legs down, boots landing with a heavy “thud” on the hardwood floor. She leans forward, elbows on her knees. “That explains it then. He’s a sucker for a super he can use to do his bidding. But if you have super hearing… that means tha-”

“That the usual limits of his powers don’t apply to me, yeah,” he says, confirming what she already suspects. “There’s still a radius to it. We’ve never had it work over a distance greater than a couple miles, and he still has to check in with me for in-person meetings eventually, but toward the end we were pushing it. It was nearly forty-eight hours this morning when I was scheduled to meet him at the cafe. But then you pulled that stunt with the dart gun and… well, I don’t really want to think about what might have happened if you hadn’t done that when you did.” 

Matt rubs the back of his neck with his hand, head dropping towards the floor. Even if he can’t truly meet Jessica’s eyes, he can feel the pity in them, and he hates it. But the uncomfortable feeling of pity morphs into one of mounting dread when Matt considers how long it’s been since the events of the morning. While Matt’s insights and information have been valuable to Jess and her search, Matt is disappointed to learn that the pace of private investigation work is slow and maddening. All they have is Matt’s best guesses from a list of options to narrow down. They do not have any concrete answers, nor any kind of a plan for how or when they will move on Kilgrave again, and every second that ticks by is another in which Matt grows closer to being Kilgrave’s puppet again. 

Apparently doing the same mental math, Jessica sits upright in her chair, taking a long pull from the whiskey bottle she has been nursing since she returned home. “So we really need to figure out a plan for you too, then, huh?” she asks, turning to look at him. 

Running a hand over the braille interface of his watch, Matt nods. “Unless you’ve got a plan to catch Kilgrave in the next eight to ten hours,” he says, flatly. 

“Don’t hold your breath.” She sips again from her whiskey, lost in thought for several moments. Suddenly, as if divinely inspired, she reaches down into the bottom right drawer of her desk. From it she produces a pair of large headphones and holds them in Matt’s direction. He hesitates for a moment before leaning forward to take them from her. But he stops himself before he reaches his target.

“Are you suggesting some calming and grounding music to relax? Because I’ve gotta say, I appreciate the thought, but I’m good. But be my guest if you think it would help you, though.”

Jessica huffs in annoyance. “No, dumbass. They’re for you.” 

Matt chuckles, genuinely impressed by her generosity, but still looking for a plan which would not immobilize him completely. “Uh, t-thanks. Really. But I can’t wear those.” 

“Why the hell not?” she asks, voice pointed. 

Furrowing his brows, Matt stares at her for a moment. “Maybe I didn’t do a good enough job of explaining how my powers work. Because I am well and truly blind, I rely on my other senses to make up for my lack of sight, especially my hearing—”

“Right, shit. Nevermind,” she sighs. “But I honestly don’t know how else you can stay out of his control if you don’t use these. At least not until I find out where he is, come up with a plan to try the sufentanil again, and get him contained in the old CDC facility Simpson rigged up.”

Matt drops his shoulders, slumping down in his chair across the desk from Jessica. Because she’s right. Again. He knows it, but he hates that she’s right, because it means one of two things for him. Either he will have to use the headphones and will not be able to do anything once he does, or he won’t use them, and he’ll risk his life and autonomy by joining them in their attempt to fight Kilgrave. Neither of which sounds appealing to him. 

“Don’t you think there could be another way?” he asks, running his hands through his hair. 

She huffs once at him, a bitter edge creeping into her tone. “Sure there is. You could leave town for a while. That would keep you safe while also preventing you from being completely useless,” she says with an exaggerated shrug. Then she leans back and drains the last of her whiskey.

Matt heaves a heavy sigh. He hadn’t even considered that, not seriously. New York City is his home. Even if it’s the suggestion that makes the most sense, he despises the idea and wishes he could do any number of other things instead. Because, sure, he’s no help to anyone blind and deaf and immobile. But what help is he to them if he’s got all of his faculties but is hiding out somewhere else? 

Pushing back from her desk, Jessica interrupts his thoughts as she stands and paces to the couch on the far right wall of the room. “Look, I don’t get the sad puppy dog face all of a sudden. This is what everybody I’ve met who’s been used by that piece of shit wants— a way out and a safety plan so that he can’t hurt you again. And you have that. So what’s the big deal? You get to leave, so leave,” she spits, acid coating her tongue. She flops down and puts her head in her hands, and Matt muses that he must have hit on a sore spot for her mood to have soured so quickly.

“It’s not that simple. All I want to do is help you take him down. I can’t do that if I’m under his control, and I can’t do it if I can’t hear. But how the hell am I supposed to do it if I’m not in the city?” He works to keep from raising his voice, and it’s no small effort for how frustrated he feels. Sure, he’s free of Kilgrave’s control and can think his own thoughts, which he’s more than thankful for, but it still feels like he’s caught in the man’s web, struggling against the choices decided for him by Kilgrave and the circumstances surrounding him. 

Jessica snorts, and it’s a humorless, mocking sound. “Oh good. So you are one of those. All heroic and shit. Lovely,” she says as she picks at the fraying seams of her jeans.

A tense beat passes and Matt frowns, deep in thought about what demons and battles she’s fighting in the privacy of her own mind. And suddenly something occurs to him. She must want to leave, or at least part of her must. But she knows that she can’t. Better still, she has decided she won’t. In the same way that Matt has taken on any number of challenges and ills in the city, convinced he is the only person that can fight them, Jessica has committed to shouldering the burden that is Kilgrave, convinced she is the only person fit for the job. From what he’s seen so far, she might just be right about that. Matt is intimately familiar with exactly how terrible it is to know that kind of a truth. Something in him softens toward her then. Because they aren’t so different, really, and his heart breaks for the fact that he cannot be here to help her take on this monster if he wants to ever be able to help anyone again.

Hoping to brighten her mood and get her out of whatever self-loathing spiral she seems trapped in, he tries for a little levity. “But you haven’t even seen the suit. It’s quite the look… or so I’ve been told.”

Whether or not it works completely, she seems to surface from her thoughts for long enough to huff at him, in what he is beginning to understand is her version of laughter. He’ll consider it a win for the time being.

“Yeah … you might want to get a second opinion about that, considering most of the time they end up looking like fetish gear or stripper costumes— depending on the type of fabric.” She leans back on the couch, legs outstretched in front of her and hands behind her head. “Who are you, anyway?”

Matt looks at her blankly, blinking behind his glasses. He’s not sure if she’s testing him somehow or if she’s just had a small stroke, but he has no idea what she’s asking. She looks up and must see the look of confusion on his face, because she corrects herself.

“No, like your ‘hero’ name? Like what do they call you, dumbass? Unless you go around calling yourself Matt Murdock while you’re being a vigilante? Seems like that’d be bad for business as a lawyer, though,” she says with a shrug.

He closes his eyes and tries to decide how much of an idiot he’s been for telling her all he’s already shared about his abilities, and how much more he’s willing to be if he tells her this last bit of information. Because he will really have no secrets left if he tells her this. But his tongue is itching in his mouth, fighting to speak against the cage of his teeth. It just feels so liberating to have someone to talk to about it with, especially someone else with abilities. And he truly believes he can trust her. But then again, she’s a private investigator and it’s only a matter of time until she was able to piece his identity together on her own. He might as well just tell her himself. At this point, there really isn’t any turning back. If he’s in for a penny, he’s in for a pound.

“Well, the papers have taken to calling me ‘The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen’ or even recently some have called me ‘Daredevil’,” he says with his chin down. If his eyes were sighted, he wouldn’t be able to meet her gaze, so he’s glad in this moment that he isn’t. 

But she doesn’t laugh, as he half expected her to. Instead, she sighs and nods her head. “Of course that was you. Thanks, I guess. For all that business with Fisk. That’s some pretty overwrought writing, though. Don’t you think? I mean, ‘The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen’?” she asks, incredulous. 

“I don’t know. I kind of like it. Seems fitting. I am Catholic, after all,” he says settling back in his chair, one foot propped on the opposite knee.

She sits up and looks him over with calculating eyes. Even if he can’t see it, he can feel her gaze and it makes him feel more vulnerable than he can remember feeling in years— since he first adjusted to being blind and learned how to use his powers. He suddenly finds himself wishing the bottle of whiskey were not empty and that she would offer him a drink.

“You’re not so bad, Murdock,” she finally says, in a carefully neutral voice. She gets up and walks to the window, leaning against the frame and looking outside. “You know, I tried that for a while myself— the hero gig. But I wasn’t cut out for it.”

Matt raises an eyebrow at her. “I don’t think that’s true at all. What do you call what you’re doing right now?” he asks, gesturing around and between them. 

Jessica sighs, balling her hand into a fist. “Balancing out the scales doesn’t make me a hero,” she says to the window pane. The raw emotion in her voice, the self-hatred that he can feel radiating off of her like heat from a flame makes his breath catch with the familiarity of it all. It’s like looking into a mirror.

“That doesn’t actually help, you know,” he says after a beat. When she doesn’t look at him, he still continues. “The self-loathing and self-flagellation? Not really. You may be an expert on Kilgrave but as the resident expert on all things guilt and shame due to my upbringing in Catholicism, I feel relatively confident in saying that isn’t going to do you any good. So why don’t we sit down for the few hours we have left before he wakes up and figure out how I’m going to be able to help you even if I’m not here in the city.” He’s not sure what exactly makes her turn from the window and consider his offer but it’s possible it’s the lawyer in him. He has been told that he has it in him to be rather persuasive at times. 

“Fine, _counselor_. But you’ve got to tone that blind optimism down a few notches because I’m out of booze, and I can’t stand it otherwise,” she says as she sits back down at her desk. Then a moment later, she registers what she’s said, and she sighs and rubs at her temples. “Oh god, I’m sorry. That was shitty of me—” 

Matt chuckles and gives her a genuine smile. “It’s fine. Happens all the time. And you caught on a lot quicker than some. Honestly, you’d be surprised how many sayings in our common parlance involve the act of sight. It’s funny to watch people realize and dance around them once they start to say one and try to change course half-way through. Better to just own up and commit, then apologize once it’s all said and done.” 

“Yeah, well some people struggle with accountability,” she says as she types away at her computer, looking up God only knows. 

He is opening his mouth with some quip or other when she interrupts him. “Do you have any family? Anybody you can stay with out of town for a few weeks?” 

Matt chews his lip and works to regulate his breathing. His tragic past is a story for another time. “N-no, none to speak of. Only friends and they’re all here in the city.” 

Jessica nods once, but frowns, plans temporarily dashed. “Are you secretly incredibly wealthy to the point that you would have a summer home in the Hamptons where you could hide out undetected? Or is that asking too much?” she asks, and if he’s not mistaken, there’s a hint of a smirk in her tone. 

“Sadly, I’m not that kind of lawyer,” he says with a crooked smile. 

“Probably for the best. Means you still have a soul of some kind,” she quips and goes back to typing away. “What about a girlfriend? Someone you can take on a fabulous romantic getaway?” Jessica continues to type, but her pace slows. Matt would bet money she is watching him from the corner of her eye. And is he imagining things, or is her heart-rate suddenly climbing? 

He tries but fails to keep from flushing from his hairline to his collar. “N-nope. Not currently involved,” he says, in the most even voice he can manage. He doesn’t understand why it’s suddenly so hot in her apartment. 

“I guess even if you had been previously, Kilgrave would have done a number on that relationship. Count your blessings,” she says with a flinty edge, her sudden brightness dimming. He can tell she's imagining her own specific experiences which would suggest such a truth and shudders to think what that might mean.

Claire’s face pops into his head and he suddenly has the terrible image of doing something terrible to her in the name of Kilgrave’s wrath. He has to shake his head to clear the nightmarish sight, and he knows that Jessica is right. As he is coming to understand she nearly always is— at least when it comes to Kilgrave. 

“Fair enough.” 

“So, I guess you can just do the old-fashioned hanging out in a seedy hotel under a fake name, bit. Unless there’s a vacation you’re dying to take by yourself. Ooh, or maybe rehab? Do you, by chance, have a raging drug and/or alcohol problem?” she says, clicking through pages on her computer. The barest hint of humor has crept back into her tone, and her posture relaxes a fraction. Matt finds himself relaxing with her.

“I’m sure some of my friends certainly think so, due to all of this Kilgrave business, but no, thank you. And as great as a vacation sounds, I don’t want to go any further away than I have to.” He’s quiet for a moment, thinking. “What about Harlem? Do you think that would be far enough away?” There goes Claire again, popping into his head. He knows it’s rude to invite oneself over, but surely she’d understand, given the circumstances. 

Jessica purses her lips, then shakes her head. “Yeah, I almost suggested that too, because I know a guy who lives there who might be willing to help us out… _maybe_. But on second thought, I don’t know if it’s a good idea. It might be best to get out of the boroughs completely.” 

Matt sighs because that makes a lot of sense. He’d rather be further away and feel confident that he was not going to start hearing Kilgrave calling for him and leaving him a prisoner of his own mind again than to stay close for the sake of it. But still, the idea of going any distance away that’s further than he could walk makes Matt severely uncomfortable. He draws in a deep, grounding breath and blows it out nice and steady, intentionally releasing the tension in his muscles. “Yeah, okay. So what does that leave?”

She pauses for a moment, still typing. Then, she hums to herself, having found something of interest. “You know, I hear Yonkers is lovely this time of year,” she says, voice filled with false mirth as she leans into her desk with her elbow and rests her hand in her chin. 

He closes his eyes and pinches his brow, resigned to his fate. He supposes there are worse places. “Can’t wait,” he says, voice dripping in sarcasm. 

Jessica creates a reservation for him using fake information— “just in case”— and forwards it to his email, causing his phone to vibrate in his pocket. He resists the nervous impulse to check it, because he knows deep down that reading the words for himself, feeling them under his fingers won’t make him feel any better about their plan. He still wants to stay and help. Even if he’s leaving in an attempt to save himself and stay alive (thus ensuring he can continue to help other people with other problems in the future) he still feels nauseous at the thought of what he has to do. Because it feels like he’s running away and letting Kilgrave win, and he hates that almost as much as he hates the man himself.

“Well, I guess you’d better get going. You probably have a lot to pack, and I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t want to cut it close with the timeline. Just to be sure.” He doesn’t think that she’s trying to be rude, but it feels distinctly like a brush-off, and Matt can take a hint. Plus, he absolutely does not want to cut it too close. He nods once and gets up from the chair leaving the headphones she had tried to give him an hour before on her desk. 

She pauses at this, and turns to him. “No, you should keep those. You might still need them. I mean, I really hope not, but who fucking knows at this point?” she shrugs in an exaggerated motion with an exasperated sigh.

He hesitates for a moment, but then decides to accept her offer of kindness. He does not actually own headphones such as this, considering that they would incapacitate him, and while he wouldn’t typically have to worry about that in the comfort of his own home while listening to music, the idea is uncomfortable enough that he despises it. He has practiced meditation for so long that he is typically able to tune out any ambient sounds and distractions when he needs to, and has regular earbuds if that isn’t working. A beat passes as he debates internally; then he picks them back up, saying a soft, “thanks.” 

Matt makes his way toward the door. Jessica follows awkwardly, a few steps behind. He turns his head over his shoulder at her. “So, I know you’re more than capable and you know exactly what you’re up against, but … please be careful,” he says around a sigh.

She shakes her head at him. “You just can’t help yourself, can ‘ya, Devil Boy? See, I don’t think that whole ‘Devil’ thing really fits. You seem a lot more like a saint to me.”

“No, that couldn’t be further from the truth,” he scoffs, hanging his head and rubbing the back of his neck. He can tell he’s blushing again, too. And isn’t that just great? 

“Anyway, uh... thanks for your help today. And I’m glad you got out. Not everyone is so lucky.”

“Yeah. Well, thanks for helping me to get out. I’m forever grateful to you for that,” he says a little more earnestly than he means to. A little too earnestly, if he’s honest.

She just shrugs him off. “It’s whatever. But hey— don’t forget to write,” she says walking up to the door and wrapping her hand around the knob, preparing to open it and usher him outside. 

“You too,” he says. “But no, really— please keep me updated. Let me know how things are progressing and if there’s anything I can do to help,” he catches himself and adds, “… from beautiful, scenic Yonkers.” It’s like a knife to the chest because there’s only one other time he’s felt this powerless, and it was a time he was literally not in control of his body.

“Yeah, I promise you will be the first to know when we catch him. And especially when it’s safe for you to come back.” She opens the door, and he swallows the lump that has suddenly formed there. 

“Thanks, Jessica,” he says, as he walks through the door, turning to consider her over his shoulder. She doesn’t respond, just stands inclines her head in the barest of nods with one hand on the door, her other on her hip as she watches him walk a few paces toward the elevator. Then she turns back into her apartment and shuts the door. He’s pretty sure that she was smiling at him, even if she said nothing, and he decides that’s about the best possible send off he could have hoped for.

\----

The next several weeks that he spends in Yonkers pass at an indeterminable rate. Time seems to have frozen for him while it continues to move freely for everyone else. In a weird way, it reminds him of the lyrics of that “Comfortably Numb” Pink Floyd song his dad loved and used to play sometimes to wind down after coming home from fights. He’s completely disconnected from reality, and though he tries to still engage in the world around him, without anyone else to engage with while he meanders around the strange city, he still struggles to maintain a grip on the present and his orientation to it. It’s absolutely maddening. 

But not quite as maddening as his communications with Jessica throughout that time period.

She keeps true to her word, updating him on every major step of the plan, but he finds himself wishing she would communicate with him more. More often, or even with more words. To say she values brevity in her correspondence is an understatement. He can’t necessarily blame her— she’s got plenty else going on right now, after all. But he definitely doesn’t. And considering she’s one of about three people in the entire world who know where he is right now (and the only of those three who he’s actually interested in having a conversation with) her texts leave a little to be desired. 

But eventually he gets the text for which he’s been waiting since he first met Kilgrave in that alley almost two months ago, though it isn’t worded exactly as he would have expected.

From: Jessica Jones  
Received: 11:11pm  
You up? 

To: Jessica Jones  
Sent: 11:12pm  
I am. But if you’re looking for a booty call, let me stop you right there and say I’m flattered, but I really don’t think our relationship has progressed to that level yet.

He smirks to himself after he hits send, and doesn’t even put the phone down, all too eager to see what snarky retort she fires back. But he’s surprised to find that when it buzzes in response, it’s because she’s calling him, not because she has texted him back. 

“Hey, Jess,” he answers, not quite succeeding at keeping the surprise out of his tone.

“You’re such an asshole,” she huffs, but he can hear the smile in her mouth, hiding behind words which she uses to cover her true feelings. She isn’t truly angry at him, but he’ll let her act that way if she needs to. She’s only called him a handful of times in the last few weeks, so this must be important, and he’ll take what he can get. 

“So what’s up?” he asks, when she doesn’t immediately explain her reason for calling.

“I just thought you’d want to know, it is finished. He’s gone for good, I swear this time. You can come home now.” He hears a cacophony of emotions in her voice— relief, regret, despair, exhaustion— and can only wonder at all that it’s taken for her to accomplish this monumental task.

“Well, kudos for the biblical reference,” he says lamely, because his mind is currently grinding to a halt while he processes the rest of what she is saying and the fact that it means he can leave this cheap motel and return to his own apartment with his own bed. “But, thank you. Really, I meant that,” he says, when his mind finally catches up.

“Yeah, yeah,” she sighs, pretending to blow him off. But he’s nearly certain he can hear gratitude in her tone, and realizes that is the closest she can come to it. He pivots the conversation to something else he hopes is slightly more comfortable.

“Look, I’m curious to know what all you’ve been up to with Kilgrave and how you were able to finally end things. And I won’t lie, I’ve been a little starved for human contact. So, when I get back to the city, if you’d ever be interested in catching me up over coffee-” 

“Make it a drink, and I’ll consider it,” she says, talking over him. But he can’t be mad. Because she’s just agreed to meet with him, and even if they aren’t going to do anything more than be snarky friends, he won’t deny he could always use another person in his corner. He’s guessing she could too. And maybe they’ll even be able to share their scars, try to put words to the unspeakable, Lovecraftian horrors endured at the hands of a man Matt wouldn’t hesitate to call the devil himself. Jessica had mentioned it as a joke, that she’d “heard that talking helps with traumatic shit”, but he understands now- a part of her was begging for someone to take her up on the offer. Just as he was now dying for the opportunity to speak to her about all of the torrential thoughts in his own head. He can be patient. He just needs to find the right opening. And when she’s ready, he will be too.

“Great. So, just let me know when works for you.” 

“Yeah, I will. And you let me know when you get back.” 

“Will do.” 

“Great.” 

“Perfect.” 

“Right. Well, I’m fucking exhausted. So goodnight, Matt.” 

He smiles, picturing her exasperated face. “‘Night, Jess. Get some rest. You deserve it.”

Matt hangs up knowing that for the first time in months, he too will get some rest. Because the living nightmare that used to haunt his dreams is gone, and all thanks to Jessica. He just hopes that one day she will allow him to thank her in person. But for now, he will enjoy a night free of terrors and monsters that wear human faces, of specters that invade one's mind and puppet their movements. Instead, he will allow himself to succumb to a deep, peaceful sleep in which his subconscious traverses the depths of the corners of his own mind, nothing but a ghost of his former self and his worries. 

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, so writing during a pandemic was harder than I imagined it would be. Turns out I've been in a creative slump, in large part because I'm depressed since the world is a dumpster fire (or at least the US is). But once I was finally able to get out of that mindset, this lovely story popped out of my head. I just had to bang it against the wall a number of times first (my head I mean. :P ) Anyway, I'm sorry again for how late it was @Longdaysjourney, and I hope it was anything like you'd hoped it to be based on your prompts. They were lovely, btw. 
> 
> FYI, for those that might wonder- I have never read any comics, though I think I've read somewhere that Matt has run into The Purple Man at some point in the comics. All of my knowledge and references come from the show, so I was just saying what-if and having fun in the context of that world. I hope this works for that.


End file.
